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Author: Admin | 2025-04-28
Other by sending identical transactions with the same parameters to the arbitrage smart contract simultaneously. Here are a few examples of these bots: found here, here, and here. By the way, these bots are still actively operating on Polygon PoS.Source: Polygon LabsA visual representation of the network of bots can be seen here. The MATIC dispenser smart contract is positioned in the center, surrounded by an "army" of bots, while the account owner can be identified on the left side. This strongly echoes the Dark Forest concept as described by G. Konstantopoulos, portraying the Ethereum mempool as a fierce battleground where competing bots engage in relentless competition.Source: Arkham IntelligenceThis strategy has proven to be highly profitable, indeed, these bots managed to extract around $230,000 in a few months! Unfortunately, the smart contract is not verified on PolygonScan so the inner workings of the smart contract remain unclear. One approach to gaining insights into its implementation would involve decompiling the bytecode, which can be done using tools like Dedaub. Though, even if the contract can be decompiled, understanding the logic behind it can be highly complex.Source: TenderlyBut why was this smart contract spamming expensive transactions on the network? That's a great reason to dive into the MEV rabbit hole! 🐇Fasten your seat belt, this is going to be fun!Wait, what does MEV mean? MEV stands for Maximal Extractable Value which refers to "the maximum value that can be extracted from block production in excess of the standard block reward and gas fees by including, excluding, and changing the order of transactions in a block", credits to ethereum.org for the definition. There are different forms of MEV, including DEX arbitrage, liquidations, sandwich trading, NFT MEV, etc.Coming back to our suspicious smart contract spamming transactions. On the Polygon network and other Layer 2 blockchains, without the existence and adoption of solutions like Flashbots by the validators, most of the MEV activity resolves into Priority Gas Auctions. PGAs create an environment where bots compete against each other by bidding up transaction fees (gas) which drives fees for other users. This is considered "bad" MEV because it impacts users negatively, causing huge gas spikes on the network. MEV is not all bad. Some MEV activities are useful for DeFi projects as well as users such as arbitraging MEV, to ensure that users get the best prices for their tokens. In the context of the arbitrage contract, due to the high throughput and low transaction fees on the Polygon PoS network, a strategy of spamming transactions can be seen as advantageous. Initially, engaging in transaction spam to drive up fees may result in some financial loss. However, over time, the expectation is that the profitability of
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